This Week In Trailers: Avengers Of Justice, The Cure - Anniversary 1978-2018, Danny's House, Chasing Perfect, Hush
Trailers are an under-appreciated art form insofar that many times they're seen as vehicles for showing footage, explaining films away, or showing their hand about what moviegoers can expect. Foreign, domestic, independent, big budget: What better way to hone your skills as a thoughtful moviegoer than by deconstructing these little pieces of advertising?
This week, we see what Simon Rex is up to, declare "Just Like Heaven" a national treasure, get hip to a different kind of talk show, get lost in good design, and then lose our senses altogether.
Hush
Director Armagan Ballantyne's short film is only 15 minutes long, but there's still a trailer for it. Here's the brief synopsis:
Ava returns to her home town, in something of a trance.
Short film, short description, but the trailer is visually sumptuous. The amount of mood and being able to capture a place, a time, and something otherworldly but instantly accessible is all on display. Narratively, this will not give an inch, but it's more than reason enough to check out the entire story once it's available to consume in its entirety.
Chasing Perfect
I don't know who Frank Stephenson is, but director Helena Coan makes a compelling case why we should.
A singular, charming portrait of Frank Stephenson, one of the most influential car designers in the world, whose designs range from high-concept hypercars such as the McLaren P1 to everyday city vehicles as the iconic new Mini.
The trailer is an interesting mix of a personal journey through the creative process while interspersing a retrospective of a life's work in design, but it also approaches what is still to come. I'm sure there's some distance between designing a 4-wheeled automobile and VTOL aircraft. Either way, like the bust that was the vision for the Segway, relegated to the domain of mall cops and tourists, I admire anyone who makes audacious moves into the future.
Danny's House
What you see is what you get with this new show, and the trailer is flat out bananas. Host Danny Brown seems like a much cooler Wayne Campbell, but he still shares that sense of laid back curiosity. Throw in some echoes of Pee-Wee's Playhouse while setting it all in a basement, and you have all the trappings for a show I'll gladly give a shot to. The trailer deftly sells the insanity, and the middle of summer couldn't be a better time to roll this one out.
The Cure - Anniversary 1978-2018
It's nearly summer and who doesn't love a good live concert film? Director Tim Pope, who has worked with The Cure for his latest endeavor, makes a solid case why this one deserves to get the one-night-only treatment.
The Cure, acknowledged as one of the world's greatest live bands, take the stage on a perfect July evening in London's Hyde Park 2018 to deliver a set of songs celebrating four decades of music making.
The ensuing film "Anniversary 1978-2018", directed by long-time collaborator Tim Pope, captures them in glorious 4K. The 5.1 audio mix by Robert Smith and Paul Corkett complements and completes this fabulously immersive cinematic experience.
From Lovesong to Lullaby, from Boys Don't Cry to Burn, from Fascination Street to Friday I'm in Love, Robert Smith and his extraordinary band – Simon Gallup, Jason Cooper, Roger O'Donnell and Reeves Gabrels – take us on a magical trip through time.
Much like other concert films, your mileage will vary based on your familiarity and affinity for The Cure. You will be all in or all out. However, the trailer attempts, quite successfully, to pull the casual fan into its orbit. Even then, we move efficiently from one hit to the next with just a wee amount of patter to make this feel like a cozy way to spend an evening.
Avengers of Justice
Director Jarret Tarnol's trailer for his latest film is tough sledding.
While trying to remain a good husband and father, Superbat and the Avengers of Justice come out of retirement to stop Dark Jokester and Lisp Luthor from freezing the planet.
I mean, it looks like people are having a good time here, but you can judge for yourself how much power you possess in resisting its witch-like spell. A car wreck, someone getting punched in the face, admiring someone walking into a glass door they think is open are all things that happen in this trailer. They also perfectly describe how I feel watching it. I would say I'm conflicted, but I'm not. There might have been a way to edit this one better, but this a cinematic nightmare.
Nota bene: If you have any suggestions of trailers for possible inclusion in this column, even have a trailer of your own to pitch, please let me know by sending me a note at Christopher_Stipp@yahoo.com or look me up via Twitter at @Stipp
In case you missed them, here are the other trailers we covered at /Film this week: